‘He lied’: US government makes opening plea to jury in Roman Storm trial
The government says Storm was a money-hungry aid to criminals; the defense says it’s not his fault that people used his code for illicit activities.
Art by Crystal Le
Prosecutors and the defense team painted vastly different pictures of Tornado Cash developer Roman Storm’s motives and role during the second day of his criminal trial in Manhattan.
The government’s lead prosecutor Kevin Mosley said Storm helped criminals hide their dirty money. The crimes were intentional and Storm acted out of greed, he said during the opening remarks.
Plus, Mosley added, Storm lied to victims of hacks and scams, telling them there was nothing he could do to help them locate their stolen money.
Defense attorney Keri Axel, however, had a different narrative for the jury. Yes, there may have been some bad actors who used Tornado Cash for illicit purposes, but that’s not Storm’s fault.
“It’s not a crime to make a useful thing that is misused,” she said in her opening statement.
Tornado Cash was decentralized, Axel said, so Storm couldn’t have interfered if he wanted to, and besides, isn’t a tool that provides financial privacy a public service?
Read more: Judge denies motion to dismiss case against Tornado Cash founder
The opening statements underpin the underlying questions this case seeks to answer: Was Tornado Cash immutable, and is the developer responsible for how a software was used?
The government also focused much of its opening statement on who used Tornado Cash, specifically North Korean state-sponsored hackers, the Lazarus Group. The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) alleges this group used Tornado Cash to launder roughly $455 million of the $620 Axie Infinity/Ronin Bridge hack in March 2022.
In their opportunity to address the jury, the defense leaned heavily on Ethereum developer Vitalik Buterin’s relationship with Storm. Tornado Cash was designed with the intention of helping Ethereum users solve a “huge problem” associated with onchain transactions: privacy.
Read more: Judge rules Tornado Cash is not protected under the First Amendment
Storm, who faces three federal charges, including conspiracy to commit money laundering, appeared calm during opening statements. He sat facing the jury with a straight face.
The jury, which was finalized Tuesday morning, consists of seven women and five men ranging in age from their 20s to 60s. One juror works as an IT manager and another works for Palantir, a software company with anti-terrorism and AI products.
The trial is expected to last 15 days in court, or roughly three weeks, according to attorneys on both sides.
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